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Learners perceptions of grammartranslation as consciousness raising

Pawe Scheffler

School of English, Adam Mickiewicz University , Poznan , Poland

Published online: 24 Jul 2012.

To cite this article: Pawe Scheffler (2013) Learners perceptions of grammar-translation as

consciousness raising, Language Awareness, 22:3, 255-269, DOI: 10.1080/09658416.2012.703673
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Language Awareness, 2013

Vol. 22, No. 3, 255269, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09658416.2012.703673

Learners perceptions of grammar-translation as consciousness raising

Pawe Scheffler
School of English, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland

Downloaded by [The University of British Columbia] at 16:03 07 July 2015

(Received 26 November 2011; final version received 12 June 2012)

Foreign language (L2) teaching methodologies of the twentieth century were dominated
by the principle of monolingualism. Language teaching specialists and linguists of that
time generally argued in their publications against using learners own languages in the
classroom and described translation as a dull activity, which did not contribute anything
to language learning. However, since the beginning of the twenty-first century, calls
for a reassessment of translation have begun to appear. This article offers an argument
for a reassessment of grammar-translation in language teaching based on learners
perceptions of this activity. It reports a study in which 45 secondary school Polish
learners of English were asked to evaluate two consciousness-raising activities they
had performed: a grammar-translation task and a communicative language exchange.
The results show that the learners considered translating sentences from Polish into
English to be as useful and interesting as communicatively oriented consciousness
raising.
Keywords: translation; grammar; learners perceptions; consciousness raising

Translation in the twentieth century foreign language classroom

There are many potential uses of learners own languages in the L2 (foreign language)
classroom. For example, teachers can utilise their learners L1 (mother tongue) to explain
meanings of new lexical items, to provide grammatical explanations, and to conduct the
business of classroom management. Learners can also be asked by teachers to translate
sentences or texts into or out of the target language. As V. Cook (2001) points out, however, there was little or no official support for any of these uses in leading L2 teaching
methodologies during much of the twentieth century. In structure-oriented methodologies
(e.g. Lado, 1964), learners own languages were supposed to cause interference errors; in
methodologies with a focus on meaning or interaction (e.g. Krashen & Terrell, 1983; Long
& Robinson, 1998), they were an obstacle to maximising L2 input.
The aspect of L1 use that was criticised the most strongly was translation into a
foreign language (e.g. Jespersen, 1904; Lado, 1964; Sweet, 1899/1964). This type of
translation, along with explicit grammar instruction, was, of course, the foundation of
L2 teaching in the grammar-translation method, in which learners were typically asked
to translate strings of disconnected invented sentences. However, with the advent of the
Reform Movement in the late nineteenth century, such translation became completely
unacceptable as an instructional tool because it contradicted the three fundamental principles of the Movement: the primacy of speech, the use of connected text, and the use
of oral methodology in the classroom (Howatt, 2004, p. 189). For Sweet (1899/1964,

Email: spawel@ifa.amu.edu.pl


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P. Scheffler

p. 72), disconnected sentences used in grammar-translation courses were unnatural and

unidiomatic:
. . . in the practice of exercise writing and translation into the foreign language . . . [t]he result
is to exclude the really natural and idiomatic combinations, which cannot be formed a priori,
and to produce insipid and colourless combinations which do not stamp themselves on the
memory, many of which, indeed, could hardly occur in real life . . . (Sweet, 1899/1964, p. 7)

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Further, translation was in general considered to be too difficult for learners and a source
of errors which otherwise would not have arisen:
In giving the pupil English sentences to translate into the foreign language, we are only
artificially creating difficulties. If it is difficult for the pupil to translate into his mother-tongue
. . ., then it must be much more difficult, indeed impossible, to translate into a foreign language
where he is not yet quite at home. We ourselves lead the pupil to make mistakes, and then we
have to do all we can to prevent his confronting us with a too overwhelming number of them.
(Jespersen, 1904, pp. 123124)

Finally, translation exercises encouraged learners to think that for every word in their
native language there was an L2 equivalent, which is not the case, because as Jespersen
(1904, p. 54) put it, [the] relations between languages are not like the relations between
mathematical equivalents . . . .
An equally negative view of translation was independently presented more or less at
the same time by proponents of natural or direct methods of teaching foreign languages.
So, for Berlitz (1898, pp. 12), translation could not be used in L2 teaching because it
interfered with direct associations that were supposed to be formed by learners between
perception and thought and the foreign speech and sound. Also, like members of the
Reform Movement, Berlitz viewed translation as an exercise leading to the learners L1
invading the foreign idiom and leading them to believe in exact equivalents.
The views on translation, expressed by members of the Reform Movement, and, to a
lesser extent, by educators like Berlitz, were adopted and in some cases developed further by
linguists and language teaching professionals in the 1950s and 1960s (e.g. Bennett, 1968;
Brooks, 1964; Gatenby, 1948/1967; Halliday, McIntosh, & Strevens, 1964; Lado, 1964).
The most outspoken critics of translation were probably Gatenby and Lado. For Gatenby
(1948/1967, pp. 6667), L2 learning should, as far as possible, replicate the conditions of
first language acquisition, which means that there is, of course, no translation. To exclude
translation, Gatenby (1948/1967, pp. 6667) also draws upon early bilingual language
acquisition and points out that in such cases the two linguistic systems develop separately
and that if a bilingual child is called upon for an interpretation he seems to have the same
difficulty as a unilingual child who is asked for a paraphrase. For Lado (1964, pp. 5354),
a proponent of mimicry-memorisation and pattern practice in L2 learning, translation was
an independent skill, more complex than, different from, and unnecessary for speaking,
listening, reading, or writing. This skill should only be taught once the others have been
mastered, and asking learners to translate into L2 before they are ready to do so is bound
to result in mistakes and incorrect constructions.
As a result of all these criticisms, translation as a teaching tool did not feature in any
major teaching methods that appeared in the twentieth century. The so-called alternative
methods which made use of translation or translated texts (e.g. Currans Community Language Learning and Dodsons Bilingual Method), did not attract much attention (three
notable exceptions in the case of the latter are Butzkamm, 1980; Kaczmarski, 1988; Marton, 1978). Different versions of the grammar-translation method may have continued to be
used in some parts of the world (Fotos, 2005), but EFL teachers influenced by mainstream

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Anglo-American ideas used translation much less frequently, and if they did, they generally
kept quiet about it, knowing that it was politically somewhat incorrect to speak in its
favour (Witte, Harden, & Ramos de Oliveira Harden, 2009, p. 1). The received view was
that translation, like all traditional teaching techniques and methods, has failed:

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grammatical syllabi, linguistically simplified teaching materials, explicit grammar explanations, immediate forced student production, pattern practice, translation, error correction . . .
[a]s attested by the ratios of beginners and false beginners to finishers . . . are more frequently
associated with failure, suggesting that the successful students may learn through them or in
spite of them, not necessarily because of them. (Long & Robinson, 1998, p. 20)

The general attitude to translation began to change at the turn of the twenty-first century
and reflected a more general shift in the views on the place of L1 in the L2 classroom.
Writers like Butzkamm and Caldwell (2009), G. Cook (2010), Duff (1995), and Widdowson
(2003) argued for a revision of monolingual teaching and a reassessment of translation as
an instructional procedure. Translation has been too long in exile . . . and it is time it was
given a fair and informed appraisal, Widdowson (2003, p. 160) said.
Such calls for reassessment were supported by research findings in two main areas of
study. First, as Butzkamm and Caldwell (2009) point out, more and more evidence started
to emerge that it was not possible to suppress or switch off learners own languages. For
example, word recognition and word judgement experiments showed that in bilingual persons the two semantic systems were shared and that native vocabulary was activated in
tasks involving the target language (e.g. Illes et al., 1999; Thierry & Wu, 2007; Weber
& Cutler, 2004). Second, research demonstrated that providing learners with explicit contrastive L1L2 information contributed to L2 performance (e.g. Ammar, Lightbown, &
Spada, 2010; Kupferberg, 1999; Kupferberg & Olshtain, 1996).
One can observe the change that has taken place in the attitude towards translation
by comparing different editions of introductions to language teaching. For example, in
the second edition of The Practice of English Language Teaching by Harmer (1991, pp.
70, 162, 240), translation is discussed in the context of teaching vocabulary and class
management. In the fourth edition of the book, Harmer (2007, p. 133) advises teachers to
use translation to help learners make comparisons between L1 and L2 and also to check
learners understanding of grammar and lexis. Two example activities that Harmer (2007)
mentions are straight translation of short texts and a translation summary of a longer
text.
Translation and Second Language Acquisition research
Until the early 2000s, translation was basically ignored by Second Language Acquisition
(SLA) researchers. As G. Cook (2010, p. 21) notes, recent surveys of the field fail to discuss
translation as a learning activity, which in his opinion reflects what has been done in this
area, that is, next to nothing. It seems, then, that most SLA researchers have taken for
granted the views of Sweet, Jespersen, Lado and the like, and considered investigating
translation empirically to be a waste of time.
The work that has been done in the field of SLA concerned mainly the usefulness of
translation in the area of testing (e.g. Buck, 1992; Ito, 2004), the acquisition of lexis (e.g.
Hummel, 2010; Kallkvist, 1998; Laufer & Girsai, 2008), the teaching of writing (Cohen
& Brooks-Carson, 2001; Kim, 2011; Kobayashi & Rinnert, 1992; Uzawa, 1996), grammar
Kallkvist (2004, 2008), and classroom discourse (Kallkvist, forthcoming). In the context
of grammar instruction, which is relevant to the present study, Kallkvist (2008) concluded
that translation exercises lead to improvements on measures of grammatical accuracy. She

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P. Scheffler

also found that there was little difference between the effectiveness of translation versus
monolingual practice involving gap-filling exercises and paraphrases. However, these results
can only be treated as very tentative. Kallkvist herself (2008) stresses that her study involved
small groups of participants and relatively few test items, and that more research is needed
before any definitive conclusions can be formulated concerning the place of translation in
L2 teaching.
An area in which there is also a dearth of research is learners beliefs concerning
translation, particularly in the secondary school context. For a long time, very negative
views have been ascribed to learners, but as G. Cook (2010, p. 9) says, they have only
been supported with anecdotal evidence (often based on the advocates own memories of
school). A case in point here is Sweet (1899/1964, p. 73) and his famous example about the
philosopher pulling the lower jaw of the hen, which is supposed to illustrate how unnatural
and unidiomatic the sentences in grammar-translation exercises were.
His view was shared by Jespersen (1904), who had this to say about the appeal of
grammar-translation exercises to learners:
And should it not also be of some significance to attract the interest of the pupils? Nothing
seems hard to a willing mind. That which is associated with pleasant recollections has a firmer
place in the memory than dry stuff. But exercises where it alternates between the Frenchman
who has taken the Englishmans hat and the Englishman who has taken the Frenchmans cane,
or where either Marie sees Louises dog or Peter sees Henrys horse they cannot be anything
but boring, even if they give the pupils ever so gradual practice in the use of the genitive.
(Jespersen, 1904, p. 15)

The grammartranslation method was not, however, just boring. It often caused frustration for pupils because learning a foreign language involved a jungle of obscure rules,
endless lists of gender classes and gender-class exceptions, self-conscious literary archaisms, snippets of philology, and a total loss of genuine feeling for living language
(Howatt, 2004, p. 156). The forms and rules were normally practised in strings of uninterrupted, yet generally unrelated sentences. The following examples were supposed to be
translated by English learners into German to practise various forms of the verb sein:
He will soon be in London. Will he be the guide? I shall have been here an hour. You will be
very tall. It will be early enough. We shall have been very angry. He would be clever, if he
were attentive. If he were attentive, he would be clever. I should have been a fool, if I had been
so careless. Be so kind, my friend. Let it be so. We shall be sincere. Should we have been his
enemy. Let us always be faithful. It would have been better, if we had not had it. She would be
amiable, if she were not so talkative. (Tiarks, 1837, p. 3)

The implementation of grammar-translation described above justifies such a harsh

judgement and there is little wonder that such courses were remembered with distaste by
thousands of school learners (Richards & Rodgers, 2001, p. 6).
However, if translation is used sparingly in those cases in which it can help learners to
realise certain contrasts between L1 and L2, then learners can see the benefits it can bring.
One study that demonstrates this is by Kim (2011). It deals with translation as a tool for
improving writing skills, and one of the areas it concerns is grammar. In the study, low-level
Korean college students of English were asked to translate into their native language their
own and their classmates compositions written in English. The translation exercises proved
very effective as consciousness-raising tasks: while previously the drafting process resulted
in few improvements in the quality of their writing, following the exercises the learners
were able to see many inadequacies both in the content of the drafts and in their form. Here
are typical comments from two of Kims students (Kim, 2011, p. 157):

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259

After I translated my writing into Korean, I discovered a lot of mistakes. There were many
unconnected sentences. I think translating our own writing into Korean is important in order
to measure our true writing skill.

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I had to revise my writing four times when I was translating. Some sentences are smoothly
connected, but others were a little too forced. I also realized that I missed some details because
I was concentrating on my English. I like my introduction better this time. I could discover my
mistakes more easily when I translated my composition into Korean.

When learners are asked to provide a more general assessment of the role of translation
in their learning, their responses are often positive. That was the case in Liaos (2006) largescale study, in which a questionnaire concerning beliefs about translation was administered
to 351 college students in Taiwan. The participants were asked to respond to 24 statements,
which had to do with the role of translation in learning productive and receptive language
skills, grammar, lexis, and also with how the use of translation affects, inter alia, motivation,
and learning anxiety. The students responses demonstrate that they view translation as a
positive force in their learning. This applies in particular to the skills of reading, writing,
and speaking, and also to vocabulary and idioms. The students were less convinced that
their ability to understand English grammar rules was fostered by translating. Also, those of
Liaos (2006) subjects who majored in English tended to be less positive in their assessment
of translation than those who majored in other areas.
A questionnaire concerning third-level students attitudes towards translation was also
part of Whyatts (2009) project. The participants of the project, who were in BA and MA
English degree courses at a Polish university, were administered the questionnaire following a text translation task. They evaluated the task as highly motivating, intellectually
challenging, and enjoyable. Almost all of the BA students, for whom attending translation
classes was mandatory, said that they would like to attend them even if they were not
required to do so.

The study
Aims
The research findings reviewed in the previous section indicate that college level learners
appreciate the benefits of translating their own writing into their L1, and that in general,
university students believe that translation facilitates the learning process, at least in some
areas. The aim of this article is to provide an assessment of secondary school learners
views concerning grammar-translation as an activity raising L2 grammatical awareness
and to compare it with a grammar consciousness-raising activity of a more communicative
kind. The study should, therefore, be relevant to a very large group of teachers working in
the secondary school context.
The present study investigates the views on translation held by secondary school rather
than university learners of English. The two populations may be expected to differ in how
they perceive the usefulness of translation in the learning process. University students are
older, they may often be more proficient in English, and if they are English majors, which
was the case with all Whyatts (2009) and most of Liaos (2006) subjects, then they may have
a special interest in English and in translation itself. Also, students majoring in English
teaching are normally exposed to various (negative) accounts of translation in language
teaching, which may influence how they feel about its usefulness.
In grammar-translation courses, translation of strings of unrelated sentences was often
used to practise newly introduced grammar rules. As has been stated, this attracted severe

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P. Scheffler

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criticism from numerous language teaching experts and was disliked by learners. In this
study, an attempt is made to determine whether translating disconnected sentences can be
perceived by learners as a useful means of illustrating grammatical phenomena. The sentences will, however, differ from the ones in grammar-translation courses in two important
ways. First, they will be used to review rather than introduce grammar. Second, they will
be self-contained and clearly separated from one another so that each of them can be easily
interpreted by the learners.
Materials and procedure
The study was performed in a randomly selected secondary school in the authors province.
The subjects were 45 intermediate learners aged 1619, 26 male and 19 female. The
pupils formed three randomly selected intact classes in which the following procedure
was used. First, the author performed a grammar-translation activity in the three groups.
The translation component can be described as form-focused close translation, that is,
translation in which learners are supposed to keep as close as possible to the original
(G. Cook, 2010, p. 136). Immediately after the activity, the pupils were asked to fill in
a questionnaire about it. After a four-week break, the same sequence was used for the
communicative activity. Finally, again after a four-week interval, the pupils attended one
more translation session and a communicative session, but this time they were asked to
provide spontaneous comments about them. The timing of the sessions was motivated
primarily by the availability of the pupils. Also, as they were available for only 45-minute
periods at a time, the questionnaire and the spontaneous comments sessions needed to be
separated. This may have had the added bonus of the pupils not being directly influenced
in their comments by the content of the questionnaire.
In both of the activities, the forms in focus were tense and aspect, something that the
pupils were familiar with from previous instruction. Polish and English differ considerably
in this area of grammar, and as for example Scheffler (2010) shows, this area is a source
of problems for Polish learners. The sentences below are examples of tense and aspect
errors made by Polish learners in communicative writing tasks. They illustrate the types of
problems that Polish learners have with the following contrasts or phenomena (Scheffler,
2010, pp. 160161):
1. Present Perfect vs. Simple Present
I live here all my life. I think it is the best place in the world.
2. Simple Present vs. Present Continuous
Every Saturday I am playing football with my friends.
3. Simple Past vs. Present Perfect
First we unpacked and put up our tent. After we have done that we went for a swim.
4. Backshift
I wanted to see how far from the hotel I am.
The incorrect verb forms in (1) and (4) can be attributed to the influence of Polish. In
the former, the present tense would be used, in the latter, the backshift rule would not be
applied. The sentences in (2) and (3) are examples of overuse of the Present Continuous
and the Present Perfect, respectively, two non-existent categories in Polish grammar.
In the grammar-translation activities, the learners worked in pairs on four sets of
disconnected sentences to translate from Polish into English, each set containing from four

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261

to six items dealing with one of the problems illustrated above (see the Appendix). The sets
were not marked for the type of issue they focused on. Some of the items for translation
were modified versions of sentences from Scheffler (2004). For example:

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1. I have loved Jola Rutowicz since I first saw her.

2. Wherever Dr Bean goes, he always causes trouble.
3. Zenek had a busy day yesterday: first he repaired the tractor and then he painted the
fence.
4. At first it seemed that the bear was asleep, but we later noticed that it was watching
us very closely.
In each translation task, the learners were provided with Polish equivalents of selected
vocabulary items. The researcher also acted as a helper and in some cases provided the
pupils with hints concerning the correct choice of verb forms and vocabulary. This involved
pointing out incorrect grammatical choices and suggesting more appropriate vocabulary
items. On translating the sentences, the pupils were asked to formulate rules in Polish that
accounted for the grammatical structures used. The task performed by the learners can,
thus, be described as a grammar-translation task.
The communicative-oriented consciousness-raising activity was modelled on Fotos
(1994). The learners worked in pairs and asked each other sets of questions exemplifying
the same grammatical structures as in the translation exercise. There were four disconnected
questions per set. The examples below come from the Present Perfect, Present Simple, Simple Past, and Past Continuous sets, respectively (the sets were not marked for grammatical
categories):
1.
2.
3.
4.

How long have you had your computer?

Do you help your friends to prepare for tests at school?
What time did you finish your classes yesterday? What did you do next?
What were you doing when the news came of the Presidents plane crash in April
last year?

The questions in most cases led to the use of the target grammar by the pupils. After
the question-and-answer exchange in each set, the pupils formulated the relevant grammar
rules in English. They were asked to speak English all the time during the activity. The
researcher sometimes joined in some of the conversations to clarify things or to ask followup questions, which sometimes contained forms other than those in focus.
In the questionnaire, semantic differential scales were applied. They consisted of three
sets of bipolar pairs of Polish adjectives, as in the translated example below:
useful : : : : : : useless
Each set contained five pairs of adjectives and was supposed to measure a different
category: general evaluation, utility, and interest. The categories are modified versions of
the ones developed by Gardner (1985), who used them to examine learners assessment of
a language course. The following are English translations of the Polish adjectives that were
used in the study (Table 1). In the questionnaire, the ordering of the adjective pairs was
random and the position of the positive and negative poles alternated between the right

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P. Scheffler

Table 1. English translations of Polish adjectives.

General evaluation

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Good Bad
Agreeable Disagreeable
Pleasant Unpleasant
Enjoyable Unenjoyable
Nice Awful

Utility
Useful Useless
Educational Uneducational
Needed Unneeded
Necessary Unnecessary
Effective Ineffective

Interest
Interesting Uninteresting
Absorbing Monotonous
Exciting Boring
Varied Monotonous
Inviting Off-putting

and the left side. Before the pupils filled in the questionnaire, they received detailed written
instructions on how to proceed based on Appendix A.3 in Gardner (1985).
The answers indicated by the pupils were converted into numerical values. So, for
example, a check mark right next to useful was worth seven points (extremely positive
assessment), and one immediately beside useless was worth one point (extremely negative
assessment). A check mark in the middle of the scale signified neutral assessment and was
worth four points. Because there were five pairs of adjectives in each category, the minimum
possible score was five, and the maximum was 35. The internal consistency of the scales (i.e.
the fact that for each category they worked together as a homogenous set) was confirmed by
the Cronbach Alpha coefficient, the value of which in each case exceeded 0.7 (cf. Dornyei,
2003, p. 112). The exact values for each category are given in Table 2.

Results and discussion

Figure 1 below shows the distribution of the scores for each category. It is a box-and-whisker
plot which has the following characteristics. First, the horizontal line in each box is the
median, that is, the middle point in the distribution: 50 percent of the scores fell below
those points, and 50 percent above. Second, the lower end of each box is the first quartile,
one fourth of the data lies below it. Third, the upper end of each box is the third quartile,
one fourth of the data lies above it. Finally, the ends of the whiskers mark the maximum
and minimum scores.
Two general observations can be made about the distributions in Figure 1. First, the
pupils gave a positive endorsement to both of the activities, particularly in the general
evaluation and utility categories. In each of these categories the median is 29, which is
well above the neutral assessment level of 20 points, and there are no scores below that
level. The assessments in the interest category were less positive, but here also the centres
of the data lie above the neutral level (the medians are 26 and 25 for the translation and
communication activity, respectively).
Table 2. Cronbach Alpha coefficients.
Category
Translation general
Translation utility
Translation interest
Communication general
Communication utility
Communication interest

Cronbach Alpha
0.795
0.837
0.704
0.809
0.832
0.830

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263

Figure 1. Distribution of the scores for each category.

A more detailed breakdown of the positive scores can be seen in Table 3. The positive
spectrum is divided there into three levels: 2125 points moderately positive assessment,
2630 positive assessment, and 3135 very positive assessment. This clearly shows how
general evaluation and utility differ from interest: there are about four times as many very
positive assessments in the former as in the latter.
The second general observation concerning Figure 1 is that the distributions for translation and communication in each category appear to be very similar. In order to verify
whether the differences that do occur are statistically significant, the Wilcoxon SignedRank Test was performed on the sets of scores from each category. As Table 4 shows, the
results indicate that the differences are not statistically significant, in each case the p value
is larger than 0.05. We can safely conclude, then, that the pupils perceived the two activities
as equally good, useful, and interesting.

Table 3. Levels of positive assessment.

2125
2630
3135

General
translation

General
communication

Utility
translation

Utility
communication

Interest
translation

Interest
communication

5
25
15

11
19
15

11
19
15

10
19
16

17
22
3

20
16
4

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P. Scheffler
Table 4. Test statistics.

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Test statistic (Z)

p value

General
evaluation

Utility

Interest

0.797
0.425

0.665
0.506

0.626
0.531

Semantic differential scales are closed-ended items. They tell us, for example, that
pupils consider translation activities to be useful but they do not say why pupils think that
way. To learn more about this, and also to identify issues not covered by the questionnaire,
we need to turn to the part of the study in which the pupils were asked to contribute
spontaneous comments about the activities.
The learners were asked to provide written comments in Polish about any aspect of the
activities immediately after they performed them. The vast majority of those comments
were positive and they concerned both some specific features of each type of activity (e.g.
usefulness) and the way in which the activities were organised (e.g. pair work). The following
key points were raised by the pupils concerning the grammar-translation exercise:

Translation is a good way of showing differences between Polish and English.

The sentences clearly showed the use of verb forms in English.
The sentences were in general interesting.
Unusual sentences are easy to remember.
Working in pairs made the task absorbing.
The teachers involvement was helpful.
Translation exercises make a break from classroom routine.

It seems that the key points above can be grouped into three main categories: evaluation of the usefulness of the activity, evaluation of the sentences, and evaluation of the
implementation. Here are six comments that the pupils actually contributed (translated into
English by the author):
Exercises of this type show differences between Polish and English. A big plus was

that we also learnt which words were appropriate for a particular situation. The
sentences were interesting, working in pairs made the task more absorbing.
It was a good exercise because it helped me to transfer my thoughts into English.
Comparing sentences helps to understand how English people think.
It was a useful exercise. It showed us in a very direct way how to use English tenses.
Such exercises are not used very often and because of that I found them engaging. I
like exercises which are different from the ones that we routinely do in the classroom.
It was good that the sentences were divided into sections, each dealing with a different
tense. It made it easier to remember the situations in which they were used.

The examples in the exercise were invented disconnected sentences (in a few cases they
were sequences of two related sentences). It was assumed that it would be easier for learners
to deal with grammatical phenomena in sentences rather than in longer stretches of text.
This does not mean that short texts may not be used as translation exercises; there are cases
in which a text is necessary to illustrate a grammatical point. It should, however, be verified

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empirically whether learners can handle such grammatically oriented translation exercises
and whether they find it easier to focus on grammar in isolated sentences.
The disconnected nature of the sentences proved not to be a problem for the pupils: as
evidenced by some of the comments, the situations described by the sentences were clear
and they helped the pupils to understand how English people think and how English verb
forms are used. It seems then that a disconnected sentence need not be meaningless, as for
example Halliday et al. (1964, p. 266) and Lewis (1993, p. 13) said, and that it can be used
to illustrate a grammatical point. This actually confirms what Sweet (1899/1964, p. 100)
said. Even though he was, of course, in favour of employing connected text in teaching, he
also saw the value of detached illustrative examples:
But in a grammar, the rules must be illustrated and justified by examples, which also serve to
strengthen the learners hold of the rule, and to make it easier for him to recognize the working
of the rule in the texts he reads. These examples must in the nature of things be detached words
or detached sentences.

He added to that that only such sentences should be used which will really bear detaching. And, as in this study, it should also be made clear to learners that they are detached
sentences, that is, they should be presented as separate items, and not as uninterrupted
strings, which was normally the case in grammar-translation textbooks.
It is also interesting to note the comments concerning the fact that unusual sentences
are easy to remember. This point could be related to G. Cooks (2001) defence of the
invented sentence as a tool in L2 teaching, and the debate between V. Cook (2002) and
G. Cook (2003) on this issue. The pupils who made those comments seem to support
G. Cooks position; for them it is not the case that [the] message of the input sentences
could be anything at all, provided they contain the necessary language elements on which
the language can build . . . (V. Cook, 2002, p. 265). Rather, the unusual message makes
a sentence, and perhaps a grammatical construction it contains, more memorable. The
pupils did not specify in their comments which sentences they found unusual. It would be
interesting to find out what it is in general that learners find unusual and memorable in an
example sentence, and whether, and if so in what way, this contributes to better language use
and language development. One possibility is that individual examples, if learners can recall
them verbatim, may be used as models for creating novel sentences in an L2 (G. Cook, 2001,
p. 382).
The translation activity in the study was performed by the pupils in pairs. The reason for
this was to make the two activities the same in terms of grouping the learners. During the
activity, which was introduced in Polish, the pupils communicated in their native language
to discuss various grammatical and lexical issues. The comments made by some of them
indicate that they found such collaborative translation a good thing. There was only one
response in which a pupil said he/she would have preferred to translate the sentences on
his/her own.
The comments concerning the communicatively oriented activity centred around the
usefulness of combined speaking and grammar practice and the choice of the topics for the
exchanges. The latter goes beyond grammar teaching methodology, but it seems nevertheless interesting. The following are five translations of pupils actual responses:
It is easier to learn grammar by talking about it than by reading rules.
It was a good exercise. We practised both speaking and grammar.
Most questions were interesting and original. I dont think, though, that the one about

boyfriends/girlfriends was a good idea.

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P. Scheffler
The exercise was a little repetitive, but in general it was OK. One must be careful

with questions about the Smolensk plane crash, though!

Talking about grammar in English is better than writing sentences. The conversation

about the plane crash was interesting.

As the last three comments demonstrate, it is not easy to select topics that would be
acceptable to everyone. It seems that while trying to get learners engaged by having them
discuss issues potentially relevant to them, care should be taken not to touch upon sensitive
issues, as the following question from the Past Continuous set might have done:

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What was your boyfriend/girlfriend doing when you first saw him/her?

The final two points in relation to pupils comments apply to both activities and concern the researchers performance as a teacher and the novelty factor. First, as has been
mentioned, in each case the researcher moved around the classroom and acted either as a
resource or an extra participant, by for example asking follow-up questions in the communicative activity. Both of these roles were evaluated positively by the pupils: as some
of them stated, they appreciated the guidance and support they had received. Second, the
pupils responses, particularly in the case of translation, may have been influenced by the
novelty factor. The translation exercise was completely new to them, and the specific design
of the communicative activity was also an innovation for this group of pupils.
Conclusion
The present article is a report on a small-scale study. What the findings indicate is that for
pupils from a typical Polish secondary school, translation combined with metalinguistic
reflection is a welcome activity, comparable to communicatively oriented consciousness
raising. So, while in the days of the grammar-translation method, the study of grammar
rules combined with translation may have been something that many pupils dreaded, it is
now described by them as a refreshing change from regular classroom activities. That there
should be no return to the excesses of grammar-translation teaching was made clear by
one of the pupils, who stated that while the activity was useful it was not something he/she
would like to do all the time. This means that the activity administered to pupils in this
study can certainly be improved; in particular, it seems that changes could be introduced
to make it more interesting, as the scores in this category were lower than in the other two.
This could perhaps be done by using more topics which are of immediate relevance to
particular age groups of learners. Also, learners could be provided with partially translated
sentences and not just with translations of selected vocabulary items, which was the case in
the exercises in this study. This would guide them in the process of translation and would
enable them to focus more easily on specific grammatical points.
Whether translation actually leads to improvements in the accuracy of learners performance is an empirical question that should be settled by research. Becoming aware of an
L1L2 contrast through translation may often involve making an error during the activity,
but since this is supposed to be an accuracy-oriented activity such errors should be corrected
and explained immediately. This may be the first step in practising them away.
The pupils in the study described the translation activity as useful in helping them
understand aspects of English grammar. This is something that teachers should not ignore;
acknowledging learners feelings and expectations can contribute to the learning process by
making learners feel more secure and confident. Translation cannot be the foundation of L2
teaching, as was the case in the grammar-translation method, but on the basis of this study it

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might be argued that it can be employed by teachers as an occasional consciousness-raising

activity to review areas of grammar in which L1L2 contrasts are known to be difficult for
learners.
Notes on contributor

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Pawe Scheffler is a researcher and lecturer at the School of English, Adam Mickiewicz University,
Poland. His current research interests include Second Language Acquisition, modern English grammar and corpus linguistics. He has published in a variety of journals both in Poland and abroad. He
also writes language teaching materials for Polish learners of English.

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Appendix
The sentences below are correct translations of the Polish sentences used in the study.
1. Present Perfect
How long have you had this tortoise? Henryk has been in our family for about eighty
years.
I have loved Jola Rutowicz since I first saw her.
I have worked in this school for 50 years. I think its time for a change.
I have been in prison for six months. I have a lot of close friends here.
2. Simple Present
Wherever Dr Bean goes, he always causes trouble.
Whenever I ask Zenek for help, he pretends to be busy.
I spend too much time at the desk. I should take more exercise.
Uncle Mietek has a parrot which speaks fluent English.
3. Simple Past
Zenek had a busy day yesterday: first he repaired the tractor and then he painted the fence.
I looked out of the window and saw a guy in a bear suit on a bench in front of the house. I
went outside and it turned out that it was uncle Mietek.
I arrived home very late yesterday. I only drank a glass of milk and went to bed.
I worked as a university lecturer for ten years. Then I set up my own business.
4. Past Continuous and backshift
None of us knew then that the lions had got out of the cage and were running around in the
park.
At first it seemed that the bear was asleep, but we later noticed that it was watching us very
closely.
I complained to them that my room was small. They didnt want to give me a bigger one,
so I moved out.
I told them that I was in a hurry. But in fact I had a lot of time.
He didnt tell them where the money was hidden so they cut off one of his fingers.
Fortunately, we set him free the following day.
They asked me if I liked his new book. I lied and said that I did.